


Do act mysterious.

by Anonymous



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Nancy Drew Fusion, Based on a children's book series, F/M, New Adult, Roommates, Troped Madness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-24 14:26:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30073614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Octavia has learned a lot over her years in college.She's learned that she has a knack for solving mysteries, that she wants to make a steady income in sleuthing once she graduates with her criminal justice degree, and most recently, that she has a thing for her roommate, Levitt.So when Levitt's entire life implodes against his will, Octavia finds herself diving head first into solving the mystery of who the culprit is, determined to restore Levitt's name and bring the guilty party to justice.(She just wishes it didn't involve interacting with all of her college exes in the process.)
Relationships: Octavia Blake/Levitt
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5
Collections: TROPED: Madness 2.0





	Do act mysterious.

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for Round 1 of [Troped Madness](https://troped-fanfic-challenge.tumblr.com/):
> 
>  **Character** : Octavia Blake  
>  **Theme** : New Adult  
>  **Trope #1** : Roommates  
>  **Trope #2** : Based on a Children's Book Series (I went with Nancy Drew!!)
> 
> Nancy Drew was pre-teen-me's JAM, so this trope brought back a lot of nostalgia for me!
> 
> We be sleuthin' in this one, y'all...

“ _Do act mysterious. It always keeps them coming back for more_.” – Carolyn Keene

* * *

It all starts in Octavia’s freshman year at Arkadia U.

Her roommate, Clarke, had been working tirelessly in the university’s art studio aiming to be featured in the student spotlight art gala that was going to run during the spring semester. Clarke, ever aiming to be the best of the best, had worked tirelessly to stand out as a freshman amongst juniors and seniors vying for the same spot.

Octavia knew she’d get it, just from the pure drive and talent that radiated from Clarke with anything she did. That was— until Clarke called her the night before the pieces were due for submission beyond incomprehensible as she sobbed into the phone.

Clarke had gone to the studio to finalize her last piece, only to find her entire collection vandalized. 

There were no witnesses, the campus security found no suspicious activity on the cameras, and Clarke was essentially left to accept that she was sabotaged and couldn’t even be considered for the gala.

Frankly, it was bullshit, and not something Octavia was willing to accept.

There was a raging determination within her to find out the truth, and she wasn't going to let campus security make the final call when the final call left every single question Clarke asked unanswered— the _who_ being the most vital.

So, Octavia began sleuthing.

She spent her time between classes in the art hall talking (interviewing… questioning…) with students who frequented the studio Clarke had left her work in. She picked up on clues, followed trails that lead her across the span of the campus, all while her brother trailed behind her begging her to be careful while simultaneously silently pleading for her to keep going after seeing how devastated Clarke was.

And after weeks of relentless digging, too many cold trails to count, and a lone, single name mentioned repeatedly, Octavia had her suspect.

Then she just had to figure out a way to tell Clarke it was her girlfriend that committed the crime.

After that aftermath— Clarke newly single, Bellamy’s step lighter than it had been in months— news of Octavia’s sleuthing was spread through their freshman dorm.

Before Octavia and Clarke knew it, the door to their dorm was a revolving door for issues ranging from who stole Jasper’s weed brownies from the communal kitchen, to how Monty’s research paper was stolen and plagiarized across three different sections of his writing class.

Octavia felt accomplished, for the first time in a very long time. Possibly the first time ever.

Bellamy was always there for her, taking care to ensure she never had to worry about anything as they grew up. But in the process, she never needed to find something that was solely “hers.”

Now, here in their dinky freshman dorm, with Clarke and her brother by her side, she felt like her eyes were truly opened to what she was _good_ at.

Goodbye went her undecided major, and in its place, was Octavia’s newly declared major in criminology.

And on the side?

 _Octavia Blake, Amateur Detective_ certainly had a nice ring to it.

* * *

Four years, many mistakes made, even more cases solved, and quite a few failed relationships in between, Octavia’s ready to graduate in a month to start working towards dropping the _Amateur_ part of her self-proclaimed title off of the nameplate Clarke had gotten her the Christmas after her underground sleuthing business was born. 

Now, said-name plate sits on her desk in her apartment, waiting for the day to be hung up for her to glance back at in nostalgia about the “good old sleuthing days” in her own Private Investigating office. One day.

One day, some day. (Hopefully soon.)

Four years, and her name has become a staple around Arkadia U.

She’s solved more than enough petty theft cases to last a lifetime, but she’s also helped Harper prove how skeevy her History professor was with his female students and found Murphy’s cellphone when it was snatched by his now-girlfriend, Emori.

She even managed to finally get her brother and Clarke together.

She’s built a team around her— Clarke and Bellamy being constant supporters since the beginning, Raven and Monty as tech support when needed, Murphy and Emori as contacts into the “underground” society on campus, Jasper as a social gossip-turned-ears-on-the-ground, and Harper as her undercover interrogator that nobody would even suspect, just from how sweet she is. 

But she’s ready to retire from the university-level cases that college students need around campus, and start solving mysteries on a bigger scale.

She’s ready for the real thing.

* * *

“Octavia.”

Her name being called by her roommate is nowhere near out of the ordinary.

Levitt always checks in if he’s heading out to the library, or if he's heading to the grocery store and wants to see if she needs anything, or even to chastise her about not cleaning the dishes when it was her turn, even as he does it with a smile after already having finished cleaning them himself.

It’s the tone of his voice that has her head tilting up immediately from where her eyes are glazing over from staring at her criminal justice textbook. 

She tenses as she sees the drawn look of Levitt’s face.

He’s standing in the doorway of her room, the silence of the apartment they share heightening her senses in the way they always do when she inherently _knows_ that something is wrong. 

“What is it?” Octavia asks immediately, eyes racing over Levitt’s figure and the way he’s holding himself. His arms are locked across his chest, and the look across his face is already breaking her heart before she even knows what the hell is going on. “What’s wrong?”

She’s already off the bed, walking straight towards him, mind racing with how she can take that look off of his face.

Levitt had been a surprise in her life when she really needed one.

Clarke had been planning on moving in with Bellamy at the end of their junior year last year, and Octavia’s then-girlfriend Niylah was going to move in with Octavia.

But when Niylah and she decided to break things off right before the end of the semester, Octavia was left single and roommateless.

She convinced Clarke to follow through with her plans, and was lamenting her problems to the first person she could— her forensics lab partner, Levitt.

From the little Octavia knew about him at the time, he was kind in a way that was so rare, so inherently good, that she knew it was part of the reason that she felt comfortable enough to regale him with her current situation.

What surprised her, was that he had a solution.

“My current roommate’s girlfriend is kind of—,” he hesitates, looking down at their lab before glancing back at her, “a lot.”

Which, in Levitt terms, probably meant the chick was a psychopath but he was too nice to say it. 

“So maybe we could help each other out?” He had asked hesitantly, clearly unaware of the fact that Octavia was ready to answer with a resounding _yes_ immediately after he first posed the thought.

Nearly a year later, Levitt has proven to be the most considerate roommate she’s ever had, and everything would be perfect if not for the pesky feelings she developed for him along the way.

So, when she sees him barely holding himself together, so completely out-of-character and _wrong_ to see him so distressed, Octavia finds herself reeling with the worst of the worst possibilities.

He’s shaking as she stands in front of him, eyes red from tears he’s trying to hold back. 

Gently, she places her hand on one of his crossed arms, feeling how taut the muscles are underneath his skin. His eyes glance down at the soft touch, and she swears she can feel his tension lessen, if even only slightly.

“Levitt,” she says carefully, pulling his desperate gaze back to her. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

Levitt opens his mouth, seems to lack the sound to form words. He swallows, before trying again.

“I’m being expelled,” is the hoarse explanation he gives when he can finally muster the words.

Octavia reels back at the words, scanning his face, waiting for the punch line.

Levitt. Straight-A, neuroscience prodigy who never puts a step out of line. The same Levitt who fought tooth and nail to earn the scholarships to even attend this university, planning to go to med school to become a brain surgeon? _That_ Levitt.

 _Expelled_? 

No fucking way.

Octavia can't help the sharp breath she takes before reigning in her emotions for the sake of his turmoil. “Okay,” she says after taking another half second to gather herself. She tugs on his arm to guide him towards her bed, him following willingly to sit on the edge. “Why don’t you start from the beginning.”

An uncharacteristic scoff crosses his lips. “There is no beginning,” he croaks, a heat to his words Octavia’s not sure she’s ever heard. “I got an email from Dean Anders asking for me to meet him in his office. I thought it was about something with the Neuro Club’s campus event next week, but he—,” his voice catches, fracturing Octavia’s heart in the process. “He accused me of hacking into the campus portal and altering student grades. He said there’d been an investigation into students paying someone to improve their transcripts for masters and doctoral programs, and that all evidence lead back to me.”

Levitt has been staring at where their hands had somehow become interlinked, but after he forces out the explanation, he looks at her with such loss, her fractured heart splinters into pieces.

“I _swear_ , Octavia. I didn’t do it,” he pleads, as if she could ever think otherwise. “I wouldn’t even know where to start!” He continues frantically. “I’m not even that good with technology, and there’s _no_ _way_ I’d risk my med school applications on something like that, I don’t know how— And my _mom_ — My mom is going to be so disappointed. What am I going to tell—“

Octavia’s soothes his rambling by reaching up with a freed hand to cradle his overheated face, the gentle touch cause enough for his tears to finally spill over.

“I worked _so hard,”_ he mumbles with devastation, leaving forward to rest his forehead against her shoulder, Octavia reaching to wrap her arms around him as harsh gasps wrack his body. 

Octavia’s emotions run haywire as she comforts Levitt— fear on Levitt’s behalf, anger too. Confusion at who would do such a thing. Who could possibly want to frame Levitt with an act that would so clearly result in expulsion?

Mostly though?

She’s determined.

Levitt’s one of the best people she’s ever met in her life.

He’s kind and selfless. He’s so caring and hardworking. 

And what would be the point of being a self-proclaimed amateur sleuth if she couldn’t use her skills to help someone she cares so deeply for?

* * *

After Levitt has calmed down, Octavia has him run through everything Dean Anders said. 

Levitt must know why she has him spare not the smallest detail. He’s seen her sleuth all around campus over the past year, but still, he says nothing about it. She fears he has accepted his fate in a way Octavia outright refuses to. 

She orders his favorite takeout to be delivered to the apartment, the softest of smiles in thanks gracing his features when it’s delivered, and once they have finished, he tells her he’s going to bed before lumbering off to his room with his shoulders hunched in defeat. 

What’s left of the remains of Octavia’s heart twinge with empathy and a fresh wave of anger at whoever did this to him.

And with that look of resigned acceptance burned into her vision, she texts her team’s Groupme.

* * *

“There’s not a whisper of the scandal going around campus at all,” Jasper informs them at the dining hall the following afternoon, keeping his voice low. “Dean Anders must be keeping it under lock and key,” he gestures with a locking motion to his lips, flinging his hand over his shoulder as if throwing away the key.

Octavia huffs in frustration. Jasper was the last one who needed to report, after everyone else had turned up with nothing after planning out their attack the night before. 

All that planning, for not a single lead to follow. 

“But _why_?” Octavia says in frustration. “When Harper brought her allegations against Cage to the dean, word spread around campus like wildfire. Why is _this_ being kept hush hush when they’re throwing Levitt out like its _nothing_?”

Her words are laced with a heat she rarely allows when on a case. She may be amateur, and hot-headed, but she acts as a professional.

But now, she thinks about how Levitt hadn’t emerged from his room this morning, and when she texted him earlier, his answer was a vague thumbs up response on her sent message.

It only left her more worried.

“O,” Bellamy tries, a single syllable all he needs to catch her attention. “We all know Levitt is innocent. We just need to find a direction to lean towards.”

“And I think I’ve got it,” Murphy says, smiling sharply down at his phone that just lit up on the table. He swipes the screen before turning it to hold up for Octavia to see. “Thought maybe I could get the names of some of the assholes who paid for grade changes,” Murphy explains. “My sources couldn’t get that,” the brief excitement at the table deflates at his words. “But I did get the name of one of the professors. From what I can tell, at least some of the assholes were in this class.”

Octavia squints at the bright screen, an unamused huff falling past her lips involuntarily as she reads the name.

“You’ve _got_ to be kidding me,” she says as she glances at his face behind the phone.

Murphy’s brow quirks in amusement. 

“Whatever it takes, right?”

* * *

Lincoln Woods was Octavia’s first boyfriend.

She met him her freshman year during that first investigation for Clarke, him in his first year of his masters program in art history and one of the first witnesses she had questioned about anyone suspicious coming into or out of the art studio.

Lincoln was the one who gave her the first break in the case. 

Bellamy, a junior at the time, very nearly had a heart attack. It took Clarke quite literally holding him back to keep him from punching Lincoln the first time she introduced them.

The relationship lasted a few heated months, before they realized that they simply were at much different points in their lives, and decided to call it off.

That didn’t stop Octavia’s heart from shattering into pieces. Lincoln was her first great love, or at least that’s what eighteen-year-old Octavia thought. And even though she knows Lincoln stuck around to teach as an adjunct professor while he works towards his doctorate, they thought it best to live their lives separately.

Still, that’s not going to stop her from doing what she needs to in order to help Levitt. 

Monty’s able to find Lincoln’s teaching schedule, and an hour later, Octavia finds herself weaving through a crowd of college undergrads exiting the lecture hall she’s trying to enter.

She finds Lincoln easily, standing in the front of the hall and chatting with a couple of lingering students. She heads towards the front, walking down an aisle between seats, catching his attention as he bids goodbye to the students. His eyes widen in surprise for all of a moment, before his features settle into the calm demeanor Octavia always envied when they were together.

“Octavia,” he acknowledges, not unkindly, as he heads towards the nearby desk to start gathering his papers. “I can’t say I expected to see you today.”

Octavia smiles at him, but finds herself uninterested in making small talk when Levitt’s future is on the line. “I’m working on a case,” she explains simply.

Lincoln huffs out a soft laugh. “Of course you are,” he mutters, though loud enough for her to hear. “And I’m guessing you think I can help?” He turns to give her his full attention, eyeing her curiously.

Octavia simply nods. “I know you can. It involves some students on your caseload paying to have their grades altered in your class.”

All at once, Lincoln’s face shutters. He’s not an expressive guy to begin with, and it’s only because Octavia once knew every single one of his expressions that she even notices it. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You’re lying,” Octavia accuses immediately, marching towards him so that she stands toe-to-toe with him. 

Lincoln sighs in frustration, glancing away from her in another tell. “Octavia…”

“ _Lincoln_ ,” she cuts him off before he can talk around it. “If you know anything at all, I _need_ to know.” She watches as his jaw twitches. Lincoln has always been a good, moral man. He clearly knows something, and he clearly wants to say it. “Is somebody holding something over you?”

She’s done this for long enough to know that even the best people can be bribed to stay quiet for a price.

The flicker of his eyes to her is all the answer she needs to know that’s the case.

She reaches out in a similar way to how she had reached out to Levitt the night before. Only this isn’t to soothe or comfort. No, it’s a plea. 

“ _Please,”_ she whispers, glancing up at him and quite ready to beg. “There is an amazing man who is being framed for this, and I need to find out who did it.”

Her pleading gaze holds Lincoln’s conflicted one for another moment or so before he glances away with a sigh. Octavia waits with bated breath.

“I don’t know who the students are,” he tells her quietly, as if afraid of listening ears. “All I know is that Dean Anders came to me to personally explain that the registrar had caught some inconsistencies with grades of various classes across campus. He wouldn’t say who, just told me my credentials to the portal had been changed for security reasons and that it would be in my best interest to keep it to myself. I wouldn’t want a scandal in one of my classes to erupt just as I’m about to defend my dissertation,” he says, almost as if he’s repeating the words Anders said to him. 

Octavia squeezes his arm in thanks, not saying anything more. She realizes what he’s risking by choosing to share this information with her.

She smiles in thanks as well, before nodding and turning towards the door. “Octavia,” Lincoln calls, just as she’s pushing on the large wooden doors. “Whatever this is, I think it’s bigger than we understand.”

It’s a warning from a man who once cared deeply for her, she knows. But she can’t heed it when everything Levitt’s worked for is at stake.

She nods without a word, heading out of the lecture hall with a new destination in mind. 

Lincoln had mentioned that the registrar caught the trail of altered grades.

It just so happens, that Octavia knows someone in the registrar who can help.

* * *

Lincoln was Octavia’s first boyfriend, but Niylah was her first girlfriend.

Clarke had been seeing Niylah in a friends-with-benefits situation from freshman year into the middle of junior year before ending things once Clarke met Cillian.

It just so happened, Octavia and Niylah clicked in the most unexpected of ways. 

She learned a lot during her relationship with Niylah, and of all of her relationships throughout college, this is the one she smiles back on with fondness, knowing she’s still friends with Niylah to this day. She was a balm to Octavia’s fire. Even when they decided not to move in together, the reasons were fair, and Octavia couldn't hold it against her. Especially, when it led Octavia to Levitt. They always clicked, and Niylah understood Octavia in a way so very few people do.

Which is why, when Niylah spots Octavia storming towards her with a mission intent in her eyes, Niylah just shakes her head with a knowing smile. 

“Oh no,” she teases lightly. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Niylah used to bitch about her work study position in the registrar, but she's still here, and Octavia’s never been so grateful in her life.

Octavia looks around, notes the students wandering about, the older women who run the registrar milling about in the office area behind where Niylah sits at the sliding window.

Octavia may be an amateur detective, but she’s no _amateur_.

“I need a graduation ceremony application,” she tells Niylah, while sliding a piece of paper onto the counter in between them. 

_Grade scandal?_ It reads.

Niylah doesn’t bat an eye. “Sure thing,” she says, reaching to a filing cabinet at her left and pulling a vibrant blue paper out. “These are the sections you need to fill out,” Niylah tells her while circling words with a pen. “And let me just write the date this is due by,” she adds on, making a show of writing on the paper on the shelf to anyone in the vicinity.

But to Octavia, she sees the response Niylah is writing to her. 

_True. See Ilian_.

As soon as she lifts the pen, Octavia is snatching both papers, folding them to hide them from any wandering eyes and accidentally crumbling them in the process.

“Thanks so much,” Octavia says with a cheeriness she doesn’t feel, the smile she gives no doubt tight. 

In return, Niylah gives her an imperceptible nod of encouragement. “Good luck with graduation and everything,” she says earnestly, before switching her attention to the next student in line behind Octavia.

Octavia moves to the side, mind racing with where her search is leading her next.

 _See Ilian_ , Niylah had told her. 

Octavia lets out an unamused snort as she exits the building back into the main square on campus.

The moment she saw the look on Levitt’s face, Octavia knew she’d do anything to make things right for him. 

She just didn’t realize she had to take a trip down memory lane to encounter each of her exes in the process…

But it’s worth it, for Levitt, Octavia makes sure to remind herself. And with Levitt front and center in her thoughts, Octavia grabs her phone to send a text to Monty and Raven to meet her at her next destination— the IT department. 

**Author's Note:**

> I know... I'm sorry...


End file.
